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Topic: Running DK Remix in MESS (Read 8963 times)

Here is my walk-through on how to get Sock Master's "Donkey Kong Remixed" running in the MESS emulator. MESS is the companion to MAME and focuses on console and home computer emulation. However, MAME and MESS are now combined into the same program, starting with version 0.162.

Step 1: Visit the MAME Dev website and download the most recent version of MAME (which includes MESS). If you don't know whether to get the 32- or 64-bit binaries, get the 32-bit (first link).

Step 2: Install MESS by running the EXE file you just downloaded. You'll be asked to extract the program into a folder...put it somewhere easy to remember/access. Once it's installed you should see this in your MESS folder:

Step 3: Acquire CoCo3 and DK Remix ROMs. The Remix ROMs are available at the author's site: http://users.axess.com/twilight/sock/dkremix/index.html Scroll to the bottom and download the ZIP file. Unzip it and place the DKRemix.dsk in your roms folder. You're on your own for the CoCo3 ROMs, but make sure you get a zip file that contains 3 files: coco3.rom, disk.rom, and disk11.rom. Let me know if you have any problems. Once you have that, put it in your roms folder and make a copy of it called coco3h.zip. When all is said and done, your roms folder should look like this:

Step 4: Command-line fun! Open up the command-line on your computer (you might have a shortcut for this, or you can run "cmd" from the Run bar). You will need to navigate to wherever your MESS folder is.

The process should look something like this:

Step 5: Run MESS! To get MESS to load up the CoCo3 emulator and simultaneously "load" the DK Remix file, use the following command. If you're using the 32-bit MESS version, use mame.exe instead of mame64.exe. Sock Master has suggested using coco3h instead of coco3 for better framerate.

ALTERNATIVE TO STEP 4 and STEP 5: I have attached a batch file to this post that you can just download and double-click to get this running. HOWEVER, you will HAVE to edit the batch file and replace the location of the DKRemix.dsk file with wherever it is on YOUR system. You can find this by right-clicking the DKRemix.dsk file, selecting Properties, and then looking for the line that says Location.

If everything works correctly, you should see this screen when the emulator loads:

Step 6: Adjust the settings in the MESS menus. You will want to adjust the Inputs, the Analog settings, and probably the Keyboard emulation. The MESS emulator will use your mouse, so in order to regain control of it you will need to exit the emulator or Alt+Tab to change the focus.

Press Tab to get in the menus:

For Inputs, change the Right Button and Stick to whatever you want. I think the first Right Button 1 is what is used, but I change both to be safe. X Analog Dec is left directional. X Analog Inc is right directional, Y Analog Dec is up directional, Y Analog Inc is down directional.

You will then need to adjust the Analog sensitivity. Otherwise the game will be laggy and unplayable. I cranked both up to 255 (max):

You HAVE to do a command in the next step. So, now, change the Keyboard Mode to Natural. You don't actually have to have to change this, so if you skip this step you need to know that the CoCo3 keyboard does not map to a regular keyboard in the same way. You will need to type @ to get " and type ; to get :

Step 8: Wait, then make a save state. It takes a LOOOONG time for the game to load. So, I suggest hitting F10 to speed it up. Once you get to the title screen, consider making a save state so you can skip the loading process. If you see this screen, everything is correct and you're ready to play:

Change the menu options to your heart's desire (RGB Display Mode will give the classic DK colors). The one button you mapped earlier is also the credit and start button. You will need to reload the entire game (or save state) if you want to change the game settings.

"Do not criticize, question, suggest or opine anything about an upcoming CAG event, no matter how constructive or positive your intent may be. You will find nothing but pain and frustration, trust me. Just go, or don't go, and either way!" -ChrisP, 3/29/15

Nice! It really is a bit convoluted to actually get MESS set up to play the game.

Something broke in MESS's CoCo 3 sound emulation at some point, which causes that weird buzzing while the game is running.. hopefully someone fixes it in the next release.

There is another CoCo 3 emulator called VCC which runs the game with no buzzing. (And in that one you can also throttle the CPU, which will not make the game play too fast, but will smooth out the frame rate.) I wasn't able to configure the joystick to work properly in that one, though.

Just LOADM"DKREMIX":EXEC will do to load and execute. (it assumes drive :0 and .bin as default.)

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Never mind! I guess you really do have to put the full path to the rom in the dos command for some reason. I got the game loaded. Unfortunately, it is basically unplayable since it seems to take a good 20 - 30 frames for the inputs to register. Oh well. Anxiously looking forward to a MAME release. I really hope the game isn't changed too much before then or that we will have an opportunity to play earlier versions. Thanks anyway Jeremy!

Never mind! I guess you really do have to put the full path to the rom in the dos command for some reason. I got the game loaded. Unfortunately, it is basically unplayable since it seems to take a good 20 - 30 frames for the inputs to register. Oh well. Anxiously looking forward to a MAME release. I really hope the game isn't changed too much before then or that we will have an opportunity to play earlier versions. Thanks anyway Jeremy!

Make sure the Analog settings are increased to 255. Even then, I seem to get a some input lag using a keyboard vs. using a gamepad. I think Daniel had a similar problem. If you have some kind of controller (NES, Playstation, whatever) that you can hook up, give that a try. I get very little lag using my PS3 controller. I'm not sure if there's a setting somewhere that can help with the keyboard.

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"Do not criticize, question, suggest or opine anything about an upcoming CAG event, no matter how constructive or positive your intent may be. You will find nothing but pain and frustration, trust me. Just go, or don't go, and either way!" -ChrisP, 3/29/15

Never mind! I guess you really do have to put the full path to the rom in the dos command for some reason. I got the game loaded. Unfortunately, it is basically unplayable since it seems to take a good 20 - 30 frames for the inputs to register. Oh well. Anxiously looking forward to a MAME release. I really hope the game isn't changed too much before then or that we will have an opportunity to play earlier versions. Thanks anyway Jeremy!

Make sure the Analog settings are increased to 255. Even then, I seem to get a some input lag using a keyboard vs. using a gamepad. I think Daniel had a similar problem. If you have some kind of controller (NES, Playstation, whatever) that you can hook up, give that a try. I get very little lag using my PS3 controller. I'm not sure if there's a setting somewhere that can help with the keyboard.

Update for Dean:

Daniel has determined that setting ALL the Analog settings to 255 will severely reduce the input lag on keyboard. I tried it and I agree.

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"Do not criticize, question, suggest or opine anything about an upcoming CAG event, no matter how constructive or positive your intent may be. You will find nothing but pain and frustration, trust me. Just go, or don't go, and either way!" -ChrisP, 3/29/15

Thanks for your help! I had actually beat you to it yesterday and went ahead and maxed out all of these settings already. It did improve the situation greatly from the initial 20 - 30 frame lag to now what I feel is maybe a 2 - 4 frame lag. Unfortunately, this is still not good enough to be able to enjoy the game and play it at a high level, but I can now at least muddle through some screens and check it out at the very least. With the help of save states I was able to play through the first 7 or 8 levels yesterday over the course of a couple of hours and that will enable me to provide some fairly detailed feedback if I get a chance today. But, I won't really be able to enjoy it until it becomes fully ported to arcade hardware so that it looks and feels and controls like DK (like D2K, for example). Along those lines, a major problem I am having is the drastic change to the aspect ratio which comes with being a port to another platform -- it feels more like I am playing NES DK or Atari 2600 DK than arcade DK at this point. Not a big deal of course if this does eventually get ported back to arcade hardware since these issues will automatically resolve themselves, but for now it makes it tough (in a bad way).

The work that the creator has done so far is tremendous so far though and I hope that he has the perseverance to see this project through to the end.

Definitely a fun game, will keep playing it after my DK sessions, I would agree with Dean that the lag even with the stats above set all the way to the max really does make for tough movements (at least on keyboard) I'm not sure if joystick/ control panels are yielding different results, That said the lag isn't so bad that you cant progress trough the stages which are creative.

The downside of having a mac. I can read this and not participate.....

Good news: you CAN participate! I just successfully got this up and running on my mac, and I experienced very little lag (or, at least, not enough that I'd notice; it is possible I'm just not good enough at DK to notice). Some adjustments have to be made to the command line section of the OP, but nothing too major.

Are you running MAME at all on your mac? If not, I'll try to do a write up on how to get it going. Unlike PC users, you will most likely have to compile it yourself. It sounds scary, but actually isn't too bad.

Anyhow, thanks for the clear instructions Jeremy! Hopefully I'll have some time to play around with this tomorrow.

The downside of having a mac. I can read this and not participate.....

Good news: you CAN participate! I just successfully got this up and running on my mac, and I experienced very little lag (or, at least, not enough that I'd notice; it is possible I'm just not good enough at DK to notice). Some adjustments have to be made to the command line section of the OP, but nothing too major.

Are you running MAME at all on your mac? If not, I'll try to do a write up on how to get it going. Unlike PC users, you will most likely have to compile it yourself. It sounds scary, but actually isn't too bad.

Anyhow, thanks for the clear instructions Jeremy! Hopefully I'll have some time to play around with this tomorrow.

Dave

Nice work getting it running on mac, looking forward to the write up if you do get around to it and welcome to DKF! I'm sure someone will add your stream to the streamers list so we can see when you're on.

Will dkremix work with mame188 or does have to be 164 version, when downloading the bat file it warns me that it is harmful and i should not run it.

It'll work fine in later versions of MAME. It should be noted that this is the original version of DK Remix that predates the arcade version. The game is quite similar but is lacking the bonus stages. The screen order, a few things in the screen layouts and game logic are a little bit different too.

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